This started out as a learning project (objective: collect a bunch of my personal data, connect it with BigQuery, and play with regressions in TensorFlow), but I've found it useful in the last 2 months of usage to outsource memory for the purpose of tracking tasks, goals and projects, on multiple time scales.
There are plenty of habit trackers out there, obviously, so this has really been an exercise in figuring out how to integrate a tracking app as seamlessly as possible into a daily routine, while generating a dataset that has the potential to give meaningful personal insights. The jury's still out on that.
Testers, collaborators, and feedback of all kinds welcome.
I've been toying with various projects in this area myself, so I'll definitely give it a look!
Is there any chance you could make a video that shows how the app works? The screenshots look nice, but especially with an app that is 'always there' a video showing how it works in practice is important.
I agree with this --> even a demo app that requires no login or something and has fixed data. I don't have the time to get python app running, (yet) but I'd like to see more without blindly giving my oauth to any HN app that comes along.
[it's the little things..devil's in the details].each { |i| puts i }
Very cool project. I think the front page should have a little more information on it though, in fact if http://flowdash.co/app/about was the front page that would be perfect.
Great work. I think quantified self is one of those area that is under-looked. We put all this energy into BI (Business Intelligence) but we don't put much effort into making products to help people better understand themselves.
I'm working on a similar project myself but I welcome innovation in the space.
I agree on QS vs BI, and I think it all comes down to monetization. I'm sure more QS apps will come, but I'll be worried about data use and privacy unless there's a very clear alternative business model.
Very interesting. My main concern is that such systems should suit their owners very well. But, of course, everyone has their own preferences regarding task management, time tracking, app ecosystems, usage patterns etc. Consequently, it is very hard to make a single open source project that fits everyone.
Me and my friend were working on a very similar project for the last 10 months, and we still hesitate to publish it (also, it is written in Scala, thus limiting potential audience). Below, I provide more information about our work, some insights discovered during development, and future plans. I hope it could help other projects too.
The project is focused on outsourcing memory, providing smooth, most of the time automatic, time-tracking, being hackable and keeping personal data private.
Key features needed for that are different integrations (we use JIRA, Trello, Hubstaff, Trakt.tv, Apple Health, sleepasandroid, Beddit); constant location tracking; convenient input (currently, Telegram bot with NLP capabilities, suggestions and autocompletion).
Eventually, it turned out, that chatbot interface works like a charm for actions like forwarding links to read them later, managing tasks in JIRA (when chatbot sends you updates, and then you can use your messenger to comment on or manage tickets; also works well with time-tracking), aggregating notifications.
We also have some analytics: daily briefs, time tracking summaries, metric-based reports. Another features include global search, flashbacks, GPX track export (to use with Lightroom, for example), history-based notifications. Future plans include: finance tracking, delivery tracking, ReSpeaker integration, newsfeed aggregation.
Your project sounds very interesting, and feature packed. Will it be open source, commercial, both? Thanks for sharing your insights on the agent interface, I've found that I (unexpectedly) use the messenger bot frequently for simple 'task completed' functionality and others.
Is there anything public on the web about your project at this point?
It was started as a pet project with no plans regarding its future. As it turned out, recent hype around AI, personal assistants, privacy and wearables created some interest around such type of projects. It is definitely going to be OSS, if we decide to publish it. I see no other way to make it transparent and secure, also people who are ready to provide full access to their accounts and location to third party service aren't target audience =)
Awesome project. Currently I use org-mode for this but Flow Dashboard seems way prettier and user-friendly. It may not be flexible enough, but as it is open source I may be able to make it fit my needs.
Sadly I tried to log in with my gmail account and it just returns me to the Login page again.
Did you ever make it into the app? If not, what browser are you using? If you find steps to reproduce this issue, please let me know, or file an issue on the repo.
Chromium in Debian. I installed Firefox now and it does work.
I'm not going to migrate from Org-Mode and Emacs as I'm too invested there but I find Flow Dashboard a very good project for people who are new to Quantified Self and doesn't want to spend dozens/hundreds of hours setting up their own system or don't need that level of detail/features.
Anyway, these are some features which I miss:
- Being able to clock inside tasks. Also expected time to completion of the task so you can adjust future predictions.
- Child tasks. At least projects should have them. Common tasks may just have checklists.
- Good editor and markdown support for the journal.
- Integration with some finance/budgeting app like YNAB or Ledger.
- Work without Google AppEngine. My journal shouldn't be a hack or a search warrant away. Too sensitive.
- Being able to schedule the tasks and habits. Maybe integration with Google Calendar, but privacy again..
I like the looks of this, can I import all of my current time data somehow? I totally want to dig into the code when I have more time this summer because I've been wanting this exact tool. Thanks for posting this!
Not OP, but I have a lot of tasks in Google Tasks, and goals & journaling etc. in Google Calendars. Being able to import, or (even better) sync with these would be a real winner for me.
I fully agree, and have the same need, in fact as I use gCal/goals frequently (which conveniently integrate with gFit), and end up having to double-mark currently.
It seems like Google's APIs for tasks/keep/goals, etc are in flux right now, which is not ideal, but I will be looking into an integration to remove that redundancy.
I recently discovered 'hacknplan' which has some nice project tracking features particularly suited to game dev, but could be used for anything... hacknplan.com, easy to use and I like the milestones and kanban style.
I wouldn't attempt using more than once tracker, and I'm not keen on tracking personal matters. I prefer the freedom of taking action on personal matters in response to how I feel and what's happening around me. A dynamic organic order, (or permissible lack of discipline).
TLDR: why are we relying so heavily on cloud based search engines to organize hyperlinks? Local bookmarking tools could be so much better!
I've often thought it'd be great to have some kind of browser extension that used search queries to automatically tag and categorize bookmarks and threads of browsing history. Then, instead of having to manually put bookmarks into "folders", or think of tags, they'd be organized smartly based on the tree of searches and links that they are related to.
Here's a more concrete example: Say you searched for "curry recipes". You click through a number of different pages, finding one you like. When you bookmark it, bookmark would carry that "curry recipes" metadata, and be more searchable in that way.
A more complex example. Say you search for "gravitational force", and end up reading part of a blog post, then clicking through to another page and another. The third page is really interesting. So you bookmark it. Since the original search of "gravitational force" was the seed of finding this third page, that query would, by default be associated with the bookmark, even if it's not directly related.
This could be extended with all kinds of interfaces. For example, your browser could display a kind of "tree" of recent search queries at all times, which could be pruned, cleared, or added to at any time. A new tab would by default inherit the old tab's tree. Bookmarking would flow naturally from this, as a way of snapshotting a given thread of browsing.
Another, more complicated option would be to bookmark actual threads or trees of links themselves. A cluster of related wikipedia pages could be bookmarked together and traced to the search query that initiated their discovery.
If a page was implicated in multiple bookmarked clusters, it'd be easier to find it in your local bookmarks.
congratulations! it looks really slick and powerful.
I'm working on a simpler/cuter solution for habit tracking and quantification (http://willyoudidyou.com) but i think flow dashboard looks great for hackers and quantification enthusiasts that want total control and to create their own integrations.
Trivial suggestion, but in addition to adding the info and a video to the homepage, a big visual representation of the project as soon as the page loads would be awesome, and having a sign up option in addition to the login would be more clear, but great work!
Nice work. Congratulation! However, I personally find it very difficult to use the app on Desktop. I had to click the App Menu on the left repeatedly to navigate to other pages. Can you make it visible by default on desktop?
Not at present. I chose GCP/GAE because I know it well, and there's some convenience when integrating with other google cloud services (like BigQuery, gSheets/gCal, etc).
I guess calling it an app and saying that I own the data made me think it was an electron-app or something.
If I can't export the data (I see nothing about it) and it's not stored on my device I think it is a stretch to say that I own my data. I get that it might not the first feature to implement, but for the future that is something that at least I would expect.
I'm very unahppy that I need to make a choice before seeing anything on the page.
And what does it offer beside what any other tracking software offers? I still don't know after reading the page. Looks like the same thing a thousand others have done before.
There are plenty of habit trackers out there, obviously, so this has really been an exercise in figuring out how to integrate a tracking app as seamlessly as possible into a daily routine, while generating a dataset that has the potential to give meaningful personal insights. The jury's still out on that.
Testers, collaborators, and feedback of all kinds welcome.
https://github.com/onejgordon/flow-dashboard